


Half-Light

by NoelleAngelFyre



Series: Tiger, Tiger [4]
Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Revenge killing, implied attempted rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 11:08:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4433210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoelleAngelFyre/pseuds/NoelleAngelFyre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No one else is allowed to touch her.  Only him, always him.  No one else.  Only her tiger.  She is his.  And he is hers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Half-Light

**Author's Note:**

> Iris and Victor's relationship takes an unexpected turn. There are some mentions of rape and murder here, but nothing overly graphic.

About four weeks after Iris’ sixteenth birthday, the inevitable happens.

He’d thought, perhaps, these muscle-bound idiots would steer clear of her. Not for any lacking attraction, because she has grown up very fast and become an exotic and true beauty, but at least for consideration of her age. Sixteen may be technically legal in the state, but they’re still a good four to five years older than her and one would have thought they’d at least consider the possibility of some consequences for pushing too far.

Alas, Victor overestimated the brain power of the college-age male. Greatly overestimated, actually. He’s very disappointed in himself.

Make no mistake, Iris is neither stupid nor naively innocent; he’s taught her better than that, and when she was cornered outside the library at a very late hour, she didn’t make a point to stop and chat. She told the boy no when he asked to be her evening companion and, further, advised him to not follow her. Naturally, the oaf didn’t listen.

The one bit of relief for this whole mess is—as Iris quietly tells him later, when they are both tucked away in her dorm room and Victor is silently listening while cleaning the small scrapes and cuts along her arms and back, injuries from when she was pinned down to the concrete—the little worm was too drunk to actually do anything invasive. Not that crushing her to the sidewalk such that her hips are severely bruised and she won’t be able to walk normally for at least a week isn’t _invasive_ , but the real offense was not committed. 

Slightly more concerning is Iris’ lack of emotional response. She doesn’t shed a single tear during the whole process, not even when she’s telling him about it and recounting the ways she was roughly handled and bruised and her clothing ripped and her body exposed against her will. She tells the tale and then curls up in her bed, tired and worn-down from physical exhaustion. No tears, no sniffles, nothing. She repeats the details with all the emotion of a brick wall. There’s not a drop of anger in her voice, or any kind of burn for revenge in her eyes. It’s as though she feels nothing.

Iris doesn’t give grand displays, he knows, and he’s often wondered if she is even capable of emotion, but he had expected some response. She was nearly raped—in public, no less; people have truly lost all sense of decency and moral ethics—and her body will take at least a week to properly heal. She was violated, physically, even if not to the fullest extent possible, and yet there’s nothing. 

Well, almost nothing.

He’s cleaned up the bloodied wipes and other materials, put them away in the First Aid kit, and swept the room for any other signs of mess or disorder. He can’t stand a mess, and neither can she, and he’ll not add to her distress by having her awaken to as much. Then, his fingers twitching for the knife in his pocket and blood rushing hard through his veins, demanding revenge, and his imagination already formulating images of a faceless prey, writhing and whimpering and screaming and begging, he takes a few steps to the door. 

“My tiger,” Iris suddenly whispers, eyes finding him in the dimly-lit room, fingers slipping out from under the covers and reaching for him, childlike, “stay with me. Please. Just until I fall asleep. Stay.”

She calls and he comes, thoughts of revenge gently nudged aside with the rawness of her voice and pleading tone. But, of course, logic is also involved; his time is better spent at her side, ensuring no one tries any breaking-and-entering maneuvers tonight, so she can sleep in peace. More to the point, a faceless victim in his imagination is exactly that—faceless, without a name and thus out of his reach. He could just as well eradicate every male specimen on this campus, but that would make a bigger mess than necessary and he still wouldn’t have reassurance that he got _the one_.

For the sake of propriety, he stretches out atop the bedcovers, using them as a barrier between his body and hers, but the closeness is still there, the distance barely an inch apart. She erases it a short time later, tucking herself into the shapes and forms of his body and burying her face in the crook of his neck, beneath his chin. She seems much smaller now, more fragile, and far less like her usual self. It angers him. He’s worked too hard with her to watch it all break apart like glass hitting a tiled floor. If she can’t pull herself back together, if this completely unravels her…

“Peace, my tiger.” She softly murmurs; one hand settles on his chest, lightly, and the sudden rush of sensation is unexpected. Her touch is soothing, relaxes him. Few things soothe and relax him, that don’t involve driving a knife into living flesh and feeling warm blood rush over his hands. But the splay of her long fingers across his chest, the subtle prick of her nails through his shirt, the heat of her breath against his skin…it relaxes him. Like the last breath of the dying. 

“Peace.” She whispers again, fingers idly stroking in place; her nails scrape from time to time, and it is a very pleasant sensation. “I have endured physical violence before. And I am not as fragile as I once was.”

That soothes him even more, evidenced by the way his entire body relaxes and sinks a little deeper into the mattress. Everything is fine. She is fine. She is here, with him, and she’s safe, physically whole and mentally intact. Everything is perfectly fine. Nothing is out of place or ruined or damaged beyond repair. Everything is fine.

_Nevertheless…_

“Iris,” he speaks barely above a whisper; she’s far too close, tucked so securely against him, that to speak any louder would be both unnecessary and likely upset the delicacy of this moment; to compliment his tone, he shifts a little and runs fingers slowly through her hair, savoring the way inky strands slip and slide from his grasp, “tell me his name.”

She stays silent for a minute or two, but she’s not asleep. He can feel the flutter of her eyelashes against his neck, teasing just above his collar, and her body isn’t as relaxed as it usually is, when she’s lost to the realm of unconsciousness. After three minutes of silence, she still hasn’t given an answer, and it’s clear she needs more…persuasion.

“Sweet girl,” his voice lowers even more; the hand not running through her hair slides up the closest arm, fingers gliding over her skin, settles at the base of her jaw, tilts her head back, and brings her eyes up to his, “you need to tell me. You promised, remember?”

“I promised to tell you if something happened.” She says, nearly a protest, but her tone is soft and she doesn’t look as resolved as she should, if she wanted to remotely convince him she had no intentions of giving him what he wants. “And I did.”

Both hands drift down to trap her face between spread fingers. “Yes, you did.” He nods, because she does deserve to be praised for that part. “And I am very proud of you. But _I_ also made a promise. I promised you I would take care of it, if someone hurt you, did I not?”

“…yes.”

“And if you don’t tell me everything, _including his name_ ,” his tone drops to emphasize the point, nothing too unsettling, but the way she shifts and swallows tells him she got the message, “then how can I keep my promise?”

He brushes both thumbs over her lips, eyes tracing the movement and briefly losing thought when the very tip of her tongue darts out, wetting the skin just slightly, and he’s obliged to remember himself before he does something rash. “Don’t you want me to keep my promise to _you_ , my sweet girl? Just like you kept yours to _me_?”

Iris swallows again, releases a shuddering exhale, and nods slowly. “Yes,” she answers, after a soft pause, “I…I do. But…”

“ _But_ what?”

She shifts a little, possibly trying to put distance between them again, but his hands are still on her face and she’s not going anywhere. “I…” her voice drops again, a child’s anxious whisper, and she quivers a little, “If…if he…if he comes back—”

“He,” Victor whispers, the bloodlust on his tongue more audible than he’d like, because it could unsettle and frighten her, but apart from another little quiver, she doesn’t try to move away or break from his touch, “will never come near you again.”

There is a very distinct threat mingled in with the promise, and he knows she hears it. Hears it, understands it, and there is another pause when he thinks she might need more persuasion. But then her fingers slowly curl within the fabric of his shirt, body nudging a little closer, and while her lips are still quivering, she doesn’t look like a trapped animal trying to escape him anymore.

“Never?”

“Never.” He nods, gliding both hands into her hair with possessive delicacy. “Now tell me his name.”

Her hands are still shaking a little, but her grip on him is an anchor, and his fingers continue stroking and caressing until the tension is gone and she’s more relaxed against his chest. She swallows, twice, and her lips draw closer until they’re resting at his ear. Then, finally, in the softest whisper she’s ever made thus far, she gives a name.

***

Intellectually, Victor knows better than to kill the boy. Don Falcone often takes issue with murder being committed, by his paid employees, without granted permission. And so the proper thing to do would be spend a couple hours with him, alone, and leave it be. Have a quiet chat and then let him live. The boy will spend a few weeks in the ICU, but he’ll live.

Unfortunately, the boy doesn’t quite grasp the concept of shutting up. Two days later, while Iris is still bedridden, nursing her bruised and battered form, Victor overhears the oaf chatting about the whole affair like it was a consensual, equally-desired affair between two agreed parties. He goes into lurid detail about everything, embellishing and adding false details to his friends, who laugh along with him when he says she “got feisty”—his explanation for the scratches along his neck, cheeks, and upper arms. He tells his friends how much she liked it. He calls her a whore.

There are very, very few things in this world still sacred. One of them is Iris’ virtue. Her purity and her innocence. For all that she’s seen and suffered through, she is still untouched, virgin in body and mind and soul. There is only one person living and breathing in this world who deserves to take them from her, and it is _not_ this boy. 

One day, she will become his, all his, completely his. He alone will be the one to leave a mark on unblemished flesh, the one to spill virgin blood, the one to touch the untouched. Iris will be his. She will come to him willingly. She will belong to him. Her purity, her innocence, and her life will be his.

Until then, her virtue is sacred. _She_ is sacred. And that boy called her a whore.

***

It’s a very late hour when she becomes aware of something odd in her room. Something that manages to tug her slowly, gently, but deliberately, from the realm of dreams and subconscious back into reality and conscious awareness. It’s nothing she can identify, not immediately, and at first she thinks perhaps it’s just a trick of the mind, nothing to be concerned with, and she shifts a little, buries her face back into the pillow, and tries to return to sleep. 

But there’s a light pressure on her arm, on her skin, trailing a lazy and ghosting path, and after five minutes she can’t ignore it anymore. It’s very real, very much there, and it’s continuously pulling her back, dragging her away from empty dreams to a place between warm sheets and a soft blanket and a window cracked open to allow a pleasant evening breeze into the room.

As she blinks away sleep and exhaustion, the pressure on her arm is the sole focus of her awakened attention; it takes her another minute, but she eventually recognizes the touch as being caused by three fingers gliding up from her wrist to her elbow and finally to her shoulder. When the fingers make an upward curve and tease at her collarbone, she takes her chance. Her body twists, quickly, in hopes of finding out who and what is behind her, in her room, in the middle of the night.

She isn’t given the chance; the hand on her shoulder grips firmly, holding her in place, and a second hand darts around to rest firmly over her mouth. Her body tenses, instinctively, and she thrashes slightly in place, protesting whispers muffled against the offending palm. Then, the hand on her shoulder tightens, just a little, and a voice is in her ear, warm exhales brushing against her skin.

“Hush, sweet girl.”

The tension fades away, and she exhales softly, enough that he clearly registers her compliance and takes his hand away from her lips. As his palm leaves her skin, she registers something left in its wake. Something warm…and wet.

“Victor,” she says softly, hesitantly, not entirely certain of whether or not she wants to ask this question and yet somehow knowing she must, “what…what is _that_? On your hand?”

“Don’t worry about it.” He murmurs; he is so very, very close…is he on the bed? Yes, he must be. He’s on the bed, with her, beside her, and his other hand is still tracing a path up her arm. “I don’t want you thinking about that, sweet girl.”

When she makes the attempt to once again roll over, to find him in the half-light and see his face and look into his eyes and understand what is going on, his hand tightens on her shoulder again. And she realizes whatever is on the other hand is also on this hand; she can feel it—whatever _it_ is—against her skin, slicking his grip but not enough that she can get free.

“No.” his voice lowers, not dangerously, but enough to communicate a point. He’s very good at that. “Don’t do that.”

“I want to see you—”

“No, you don’t.” he insists, in the same low tone; his other hand, the one not clasped around her shoulder, brushes slow touches along her crown, rustling curls lightly, running backwards to the base of her skull. “Not now.”

“But—”

“Shhh…” he sets a slow, deliberate kiss to her temple, then another to her cheek, and then, inspiring a soft gasp from her lips in the process, to the nape of her neck, where he lingers for a long moment before returning to her ear, “Go back to sleep.”

Whatever he left on her skin is beginning to dry; it feels sticky and tight, and it’s inspiring a terrible suspicion within her mind. She has always suspected, yes, because he’s never made this aspect of his life a true secret between them, but it’s always been a world apart. Something mentioned here and there, in brief moments of conversation, but never actually brought fully into their relationship. _But now…_

“Victor,” she whispers again, “what did you do?”

For a moment, he says nothing, and she’s worried that maybe she’s pushed it too far. Maybe she’s asked one question too many, even angered him with her inquiry. She thinks to retract the question, if it is even possible to do so, and make the necessary apologies. But then, she feels the mattress shift, dipping slightly, and a warm body fits against hers, chest to back; one arm curls loosely above her head, on the pillow, and the other hand slips fingers back into her hair, drawing loose curls away from her face and neck, and his thumb strokes along the left cheek.

“I told you,” Victor whispers in her ear, “when anyone offends you, when anyone threatens you, when anyone _hurts you_ ,” the low emphasis in his voice sends a shiver up her spine, “you will tell me, and I will take care of it. That was the promise we made to each other, Iris. Remember?”

Of course she remembers; they had this conversation only a few nights ago. How could she not remember? Of course she remembers.

“You kept your promise to me.” He continues, lips brushing over her ear in a way that doesn’t feel accidental, but rather, deliberate and intentional. “I kept mine to you.”

“And is this how you will always keep your promises?” she can barely get the words out, because her throat is locked and tight and it takes a supreme effort just to get a breath past her lips, let alone coherent speech. It would be one matter if all this was inspired by fear, or terror, or disgust. She wishes it was. She truly, deeply, completely wishes it was. 

But it’s not.

He kisses her temple again, and then her nape, twice, fingers stroking here and there and leaving paths across her skin that feel like fire, like ice, like hunger and wanting. The earlier desire to see him is now mingled with trepidation, because to see him would be to see his eyes and every unhidden desire. She wants to see it, to see him, and yet she doesn’t. It’s confusing. Too confusing.

“You know who I am,” his voice suddenly breaks into her thoughts as a low whisper—a serpent’s whisper in her ear, and she wonders if this is how Eve felt in the garden, with the serpent draped about her shoulders and his lipless mouth at her ear—while his hand returns to her shoulder, “and what I am. Would you have me be anything else, Iris?”

The exhale she releases feels like all the air has erupted from her lungs, leaving them empty and struggling for new breaths that she can’t quite take in. Her body seems more content to suffocate itself, unable to do anything but devote itself to comprehending his words, the way he’s lying with her, touching her, caressing her, the way he feels against her…it’s all too much.

“Victor…” her voice is softer this time, but he doesn’t let her finish, again. Instead, he kisses her temple again, and again, and again, drags a hand back down to hers, curls fingers around her wrist and brushes his thumb along her knuckles.

“Sleep, my sweet girl.” He breathes. “Everything is taken care of. Now sleep.”

***

The remains are found four days later, tossed out like trash in a back alley, about five miles from the university grounds. Police, according to the media coverage, had to identify him by his dental records. His features were unrecognizable, even by his parents. There is talk of additional mutilation, and though exact details are not given, Iris already knows.

The discovery makes headlines for three straight weeks, both on campus and in the city, with articles writing about the “grisly sight” and how the community is “paralyzed with grief and shock”. She sees the young man’s off-and-on girlfriend dissolving into tears, at random moments throughout a given day, usually in the arms of one or two of her female companions.

The police question everyone on campus—professors, students, everyone. She is visited by a person she assumes to be the investigating detective, a dark-skinned, bald-headed man with a set jaw and weary eyes. The kind of man who looks like he’s investigated one too many of these cases, and never with any real reward at the end of each case.

He introduces himself as Detective Allen. He asks her if she knows anyone who would want to hurt the victim. If there was any disagreement between him and another student, or if someone might be carrying a grudge for any reason against him. He asks what her relationship was with the victim.

She tells him she doesn’t know of any grudge or disagreement between the young man and another student, that she can’t think of anyone who would want to _hurt_ the victim, and that she had no relationship with the victim. Most of what she says is true; the rest is only partially a lie. Sometimes, she fears she’s losing any understanding of what is truth and what is a lie. Sometimes, she speaks and hears Victor’s voice in her ears and on her tongue.

She doesn’t tell this man how she’d woken up days earlier, before the body was even found, before anyone even knew the young man was missing, let alone dead. How she had needed to wash her bedcovers in the bathroom sink and shower because there was no way she could sneak down to the laundry room without someone at least raising an eyebrow at the visible stains. How it had taken her ten minutes to wash the dried blood off her face and arm, and how she’d felt a very strange sense of remorse when it was wiped away and her skin was clean again.

Even now, stretched along her window sill, staring blankly out the window, she feels the imprint of the stains, still lingering on her skin. She feels the caressing path along her arm and the invisible marks left behind when his fingers curled around her shoulder. Her skin tingles from where his lips kissed her temple, her cheek, and her neck…She lifts one hand and brushes fingertips over the back of her neck, right at the nape, where he kissed her. Where he left a mark so deep, so imprinted upon her skin and muscle and every nerve that runs throughout that small, otherwise-insignificant span of flesh, that she feels it like a fresh brand.

No one else. _No one else is allowed to touch you._ Only him, always him. No one else. Only her tiger. She is his. And he is hers.

***

Victor catches quite a lecture from Don Falcone, because, unfortunately, the elder can recognize Victor’s handiwork a mile away, and there’s no way he wouldn’t recognize the boy’s death as exactly that.

He’s told, in no uncertain terms, that he is not to be “dropping bodies left and right”, not without permission. He says he understands. He’s reminded that their arrangement allows him to spend as much time with people as he wants, provided they disappear when Don Falcone wants them to disappear and they eventually end up dead. He doesn’t need to find additional playthings when he’s already given enough as it is. He murmurs an apology and nods his head.

He’s also reminded that “unnecessary deaths” draw unwanted attention, and even with the police department essentially under Don Falcone’s thumb, there’s no need to abuse the power. He replies to that with another nod, this one silent, and fortunately there is no verbal response demanded, because he would be obliged to inform the elder that there was nothing _unnecessary_ about the boy’s death. It was very necessary, and warranted, and deserved. But that would require further explanation, and Victor doesn’t like long explanations. He doesn’t like hearing them and he doesn’t like giving them.

As punishment, he’s essentially grounded to information extraction for two months. It’s about the lowest class of assignment he can be given, because it requires minimal hands-on interaction and there is to be _no death involved_. Don Falcone just wants information and he wants the providing party alive and breathing and, most insulting of all, physically intact.

But, rather than sulk and pout, he decides to use this as an opportunity to experiment. There are, after all, more ways to torture a human being than with tools. Shattering a person’s mind is a fine art, a delicacy of sorts, especially when it is done with nothing but words. And he’s been looking for a chance to refine the art. If he’s going to be confined to his basement for two months, and not permitted to use his usual toys, he can at least make the most of this and be both productive and perfecting a new skill.

By the time the months have passed, he’s done very good work and Don Falcone is very pleased. Pleased enough to take him off menial duty and let him roam free again, to do as he wishes and go where he desires. He takes the shortest and quickest route to the university and makes his way to a secluded section of the campus: a little island of green grass and tall trees, where there is plenty of shade to go around and fresh air to be breathed. A little slice of paradise, as it were.

It’s not quite his idea of paradise, but at least it’s quiet. He likes peace and quiet.

Iris is here, tucked beneath a tree in the shade. It’s interesting to see her out in the daylight, pale skin and dark hair in the sunlight. He’s far more accustomed to seeing her in shadows, in solitude, away from the public and away from the light. But he rather likes the vision: the sun catches her inky strands nicely and gives her pale skin a pleasant glow. She still looks far more exquisite in moonlight, when the pale glow makes her eyes burn and her skin glisten like ice.

But this isn’t bad.

Her eyes were closed, but they open as he comes within a short distance from her little place under the tree. There is a part of him—albeit, a very small part not otherwise touched by his confidence and self-assurance—that wonders what her reaction will be to seeing him again. It’s been two months, and he wasn’t given the chance to give the traditional farewells and promises of _I’ll be back soon_. He’s not much for giving those formalities anymore—not now that they’re no longer mandated to maintain a public image—but he does still like to showcase good manners. His mother did raise him right; he’d hate to do injustice to her memory.

He waits exactly two minutes and thirteen seconds. And then, with grace and fluid motion, she’s on her feet and walking towards him. It’s the scene from fairytales and happy endings, when lovers are reunited after the noble prince overcomes the impossible and returns to his lady fair. It’s a moment of peace and tranquility and everyone walks off into the sunset with happy smiles and light hearts.

He’s no prince, and she’s hardly the epitome of a fair and lovely princess, and there are no birds singing in the sky above them and no music materializing from thin air around them. And when she stops in front of him, her eyes aren’t exactly sparkling and glowing and there’s no joyous expression on her face.

“Do that to me again, Victor.” She says, very slowly and very quietly, “Leave me again, like that, without a word, for days and weeks. And I promise you, I will harvest your internal organs with my fingernails.”

He feels the corners of his mouth twitching up before he can even try and stop the grin from spreading across his face. “I missed you too, sweet girl.”


End file.
